The Hanover Fair in 2018
The partner country of this year’s Hannover Messe was Mexico, which had brought along some startups as well as some exhibitors. Once again this year, the organisers of the fair had created an area specifically for start-ups in the Young Tech Enterprises area in Hall 17. These represented the general trends of this year’s Hannover Messe 2018, such as Industry 4.0, Integrated Energy, Smart Supply, Predictive Maintenance, Cobots, Lightweight Construction and Digital Twin. For this purpose, a start-up matchmaking between the exhibiting companies and start-ups was offered again this year as part of Young Tech Enterprises. Ambi-Vation and the Federal Association of German Startups were able to implement this. In addition, a total of 45 start-ups presented on stage during the 5 days, which was supplemented by several technical presentations and panel discussions.

Ambi-Vation on forms of cooperation with startups and their advantages and disadvantages

As part of the presentation on startup cooperation forms at the 2nd conference on start-up cooperations in the automotive & mobility sector, various forms of cooperation will be presented. These collaborations range from a loose exchange of established companies and start-ups, for example events, to a complete takeover of a start-up, including integration into the established company.

The choice of cooperation form depends strongly on the objective of the cooperation and indeed varies according to the maturity level of the two stakeholders. When working together, it is important to do the documentation of the goals of both actors and the associated identification of a win-win.Continue Reading →

Pioneering, risk-taking and an informal culture of trying out, failing and getting up again, learning and developing ideas, distinguishes start-ups. Ideal conditions for developing new technologies and launching innovative products on the market.SMEs are particularly benefiting from cooperation with start-ups, as medium-sized companies usually have a lean organization with short decision-making processes and fast response options for market developments. Here are some examples of successful cooperations between established companies and innovative start-ups:

IABG and innosabi – Idealab for digitalizationThe Munich-based start-up innosabi helps companies to find the most creative and successful ideas of their employees.The basis for this is a software platform for company-internal idea management in which employees can exchange ideas and upload their ideas.The industrial plant company in Ottobrunn has tested the platform in a beta-test and, above all, highlighted the highly efficient innovation process.

The Berlin-based partner for development and technology promotion, Berlin Partner organized the Berlin Demoday on 13th February 2017 together with B!, the foundation network of berlin universities. It showcased the latest start-ups from the universities and colleges of Berlin.The goal is to present the start-ups to a broad public of the economy and thus to offer them a stage.Through this exchange, start-ups can win customers and partners, while company representatives can already get to know the innovations of tomorrow today.Not infrequently, innovation partnerships are a result of this format.For all those who could not be personally present, a list of all start-ups with a link to their websites can be found at the end of the article.In case of a contact request (Ambi-Vation), we would be happy to introduce you personally.

At the end of February I traveled to the Bay Area (Europeans frequently call it Silicon Valley) to learn more about Open Innovation of companies and start-ups as well as about start-ups in the field of Artificial Intelligence. I’ve been planing already for a while to connect with the global “innovation” hub and used the trip to learn best practices in both domains.

The two-weeks learning journey started in Berkeley at Cal, the University of California Berkeley, where a good friend of mine did a research semester at Haas School of Business. Getting to know the open mindset and having a nice conversation with Henry Chesbrough kickstarted my trip to the Bay Area. Henry is famous for coining the term “Open Innovation” and does a lot of research in this domain with the Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation. The team of next47 also matchmakes start-ups for collaborations with the Siemens AG and we had great conversations on best practices and bad practices when doing open innovation with start-ups. The trend scouting is an essential topic as well as the visibility in and the strong network of the Bay Area. An impressive open innovation project (not sure if start-ups are involved) is the Airbus – Siemens e-aircraft moonshot.

This article is intended for everyone interested to learn more about artificial intelligence start-ups, their business cases and application fields. The topic is very exiting for me considering the breadth of application fields, the business impact, the security implications and the impact on humans/society (see singularity).

The following list showcases start-ups using artificial intelligence (or stating to use), that are based or headquartered in Germany, Austria and Switzerland (the German-speaking countries) as of 12/2016 (Download: Excel, PDF, Infografic). Get in touch for the status quo.Continue Reading →